8:49am Thursday 11th March 2010
By Ky Capel
BRIDPORT Reserves’ boss Mike Savage hopes his men can bounce back from a “frustrating” home defeat to Sturminster Marshall by booking their place in the Dorset Senior Trophy final.
The Bees travel to Holt United Reserves on Saturday (2.30pm) with the sole aim of reaching their second final in succession.
Savage’s side suffered a 1-0 loss at the hands of Parley Sports in last season’s showpiece, and after Tuesday night’s 3-0 reverse the reserve-team manager is even more determined to avoid semi-final disappointment this weekend.
He said: “We need to get back on track and hopefully we’ll get a result on Saturday. We want to be looking forward to a cup final, otherwise our season will be over.”
Looking back on the Dorset Premier League defeat to Sturminster, Savage could not hide his disappointment with the official’s “awful decision” to dismiss Gary Bulman on the hour-mark, at which point the game was poised at 1-0 in the away side’s favour.
He added: “It was an innocuous challenge and both players got straight up and ran away.
“The referee pulled out a red and the lad from Sturminster thought it was for him at first.
“I thought perhaps Gary had said something to the ref but I spoke to the ref afterwards and he said it was for violent conduct – which I don’t understand at all as I didn’t even think it was a foul in the first place.
“I was a ref myself and I know they have a hard enough job but it was an awful decision. Even their manager said he didn’t see anything wrong with the challenge.”
Bees: Tozer, Maidment, Herbst (Gale 65), Taylor, Belt (M Bulman 55), Stordy, Coggins, G Bulman, R Cummings, B Clarke, C Bulman.
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